Friday, April 18, 2008

Toronto FC Kit: The Best of M.L.S. in 2008

Looking over the league's crop of new uniforms, what strikes me is the dullness of all the team's jerseys looking essentially the same just in different colors. All 14 M.L.S. clubs are outfitted by German sportswear giants adidas, and their famous/infamous three stripes. I personally like the stripes but I wonder if it's really necessary for adidas to put them on the sleeves of every single shirt. Some shirts would just look better without the 3 stripes.

Some other random observations:

The Red Bulls do not make sense to me. First, they go ahead and make their home shirt white. Huh? I thought it was Red Bulls, not White Bulls. Then, they make navy blue their away color, meaning they don't have a red shirt at all! I want to root for this team so badly, and I do, but c'mon. Someone get with the program over there. And tone down the size of that huge advertisement on your shirt. Don't they understand that they would sell so many more of those Angel and Altidore jerseys if that ad was just a little smaller? In fact, they should just put the "Red Bull" typeface right on the front, like a normal club. That would be so much more legit. The Clashing Bull logo is already on the crest. Which brings me to that. Why is the logo two red bulls clashing with each other? Shouldn't they be teammates? I know that's the logo on a regular can of Red Bull but couldn't they have put some effort and thought onto this? Just one bull in the crest would have been so much better. There, Red Bulls. That'll be $20,000.

The Galaxy re–branding was pretty lame. Their logo is decent, but they should have gone with navy blue instead of all–white as their home shirt. Don't give me that "Oh, it's summer and it's really hot in L.A., so white is the smart choice" b.s. Most M.L.S. games are at night and the season starts in April when it's still not that hot. Besides, during day matches where it's really hot, they could have always switched to the white kit. I just think this was a lame attempt to keep up the Beckham/Real Madrid continuity in order to sell more jerseys worldwide. Pfeh.

One place I actually miss the 3 stripes is on DC United. Adidas has been outfitting them since their inception and those 3 horizontal stripes across the chest where there forever. It's a little bizarre that adidas would remove them after all these years.

Colorado's jerseys are actually quite nice. They've got that whole Aston Villa/West Ham vibe. They would qualify as my 2nd favorite M.L.S. kit design. My favorite would have to be...Toronto F.C. Last year's expansion team really has the league's best kit. Mainly because of the seldom used but gorgeous red and gray color scheme. I also think that the template used for the kits is one of the nicer ones adidas currently has on offer. I may be in the minority on this, but the gray away shirt is a thing of beauty too. I just wish it was paired with a black or gray short.

Note: Time is quickly running out on our first ever raffle. Don't forget to mail your entry to footballkitblog@gmail.com before 12:00 noon this coming Sunday, April 20th. Anyone that sends an email before then to the above address with the subject line "Raffle" will be entered in the drawing. Limit 3 entries per person please. The winner will be announced on Monday, April 21st. Full details here.Good luck everyone.